Hiring Wisdom: Hard Questions Make For Better Hires

Although impolite, rude, and bullying social media behavior grab the headlines, ours is still a basically polite society. That’s why most of us rely on our pre-employment paperwork to ask job applicants the tough questions about drugs and honesty. Then we compound that mistake by thinking we’ll find out about dependability and safety when we do our reference checks. (If we, in fact, take the time to do them at all.)

However, it’s by far harder to lie or deceive in person than on paper. So, if you really want to make the best possible hiring decisions, brace yourself and ask during the interview:

Article Continues Below

Sponsored Content

3 Strategies for Building a Successful Company Culture

What's one of the best ways to attract talented candidates and encourage them to stick around? Establish a great company culture and showcase that culture to the world.
In our latest eBook, you'll learn three proven strategies for building your company's culture and read real stories of how those strategies led companies like JetBlue, Publix, and Airbnb to extraordinary success.
Download your free copy today!

Other than personal illness, what would be a reason you couldn’t be at work every day?

Tell me about your workplace safety record.

I’ve also found that the applicants who ask me the hardest questions turn out to be the best employees because we’ve both dug deep enough to get the most important information and come to a mutually good decision. These questions include:

Why did the person who last held this job leave?

What’s your overall rate of employee turnover?

Tell me about the management style and personality of the person I’ll be working for.

Mel Kleiman, CSP, is an internationally-known authority on recruiting, selecting, and hiring hourly employees. He has been the president of Humetrics since 1976 and has over 30 years of practical experience, research, consulting and professional speaking work to his credit. Contact him at mkleiman@humetrics.com.